After noticing Krystal standing next to me, I turn to look back at my mom. I opened my mouth to attempt to say something so I didn’t look so suspicious, but my brain didn’t quite catch up to the plan. I stood there -- mouth open and mute. I still had nothing to say. I glanced back at Krystal to see if maybe she had come up with something herself, but she looked just as stumped as I did. After slightly smiling and bowing, she had pursed in her lips and returned my gaze with furrowed brows of worry. We then both quickly glanced back at my mom at the same time with a hasty smile. “Umm, yeah. This is… uhh, Krystal. You remember Krystal, mom?” Of course she clearly remembers her, and I mean… how could she not? I had her dangling from my back on our debut stage, and loudly declared how in love I was with her. Kinda hard to forget. Not to mention, I did formally introduce them through a Skype call way before the debut. So, of course I knew she remembered her, but… I wanted to delay the conversation until I could come up with a reasonable explanation for her being here. Right now. In our house.
“Of course I remember Krystal. I never forget a face. She’s your member, right? The one you introduced me to, who’s from San Francisco?” My mom reassured her memory to us, as she began to walk in our direction.
“Uhh, yeah. That’s the one.” I chuckled nervously. I gulped, but then I saw a soft smile draw over my mother’s face, and then suddenly saw Krystal being embraced in a gentle and quick hug. Krystal kept her arms to her sides, as she was completely taken off guard by the hug. She had no idea what to do with it.
“It’s so nice to finally meet you in person, Krystal.” My mom said warmly, as she then stepped back and placed her hands on Krystal’s shoulders as to take a better look at her. Krystal’s face was priceless. She was just as shocked as I was, but hid it well with a twitch of a smile.
“It’s so nice to finally meet you too, Mrs. Liu.” Krystal responded shyly. What is this? Am I on Punk’d or something? Or is my mom being civil just because she’s in front of Krystal? My mom then turned towards me, and while leaving one hand on Krystal’s shoulder, she placed the other hand on my cheek cupping it tenderly. Her smile increased at my sight, as she also then pulled me into an embrace. She held me for much, much longer. My arms were initially to my sides, but I then slowly wrapped them around her. I wasn’t quite sure if this was my mom’s way of secretly giving Krystal and me her blessing, or just her completely pretending like nothing ever happened – pretending as if she never walked away from my debut stage in disappointment to begin with. I held a confused expression on my face until the moment my mother spoke again.
“I’m making your favorite.” Mom said softly. I suddenly couldn’t help but show a goofy smile on my face.
“Maahh…” I said with an embarrassed chuckle, as she leaned away and began walking back towards the kitchen.
“Oh dear, I need to get to stirring this.” My mom said, as she picked up her wooden spoon again to attend to the stove. Krystal turned to me and smiled warmly after admiring the mother-daughter moment I just had.  “Amber, did you already invite Krystal over for lunch?” my mom asked.
“Umm, yeah. I did.” I responded, as I directed Krystal towards the already set dining table. I pulled out a seat for her first, and then one for myself to sit right next to her.
“Oh, perfect! I made just enough for everyone then.” Mom said. “Your sister and Esteban should be here soon, too. I figured he would just eat a lot, being that he’s a young man.” My mom explained, as she chuckled.
“I’d put money down that Krystal would probably eat more than any guy.” I pointed at Krystal teasingly, as she silently and jokingly glared at me with gritted teeth.  
“Krystal, is this true?” My mom asked with a jokingly shocked tone as she turned briefly to look back at us over her shoulder. “You look so in shape! I can’t possibly take what Amber is saying as true.”
“You can’t. She’s lying.” Krystal said soft spoken, still too shy around my mom to speak up further. We all laughed lightly, as we then heard the front door open.
“By the way, Krystal… when did you get here?” And there it was. The question. She invited us into an apparently safe little room – she even walked in with us to reassure us of how safe the room was, and then dropped the bomb and ran for it, leaving us behind.
“She just got in today. Hey, mom!” Jackie chimed in right on time. Guess she did save our asses after all; not with cooking us food, but still an amazing save nonetheless.  
“Yeah, what Jackie said.” I agreed nervously, as Jackie had walked into the dining room, with Esteban holding onto her hand from behind. She immediately saw and felt the atmosphere in the room, and knew right away what was going on – or about to go on.
“Yes. I just flew in today.” Krystal asserted.
“Amber told her what had been going on, and she just wanted to come and cheer her up, show some support.” Jackie elaborated. We all nodded, as Jackie walked over towards the kitchen to give mom a hug.
“That is so nice of you, Krystal. I really appreciate everything you’ve done for Amber, really… – here and in Korea.  I really do. She’s always telling me about how you’ve been teaching her Korean, taking her shopping – and thank God for that one, too – we all know Amber needed some shopping advice.” My mom ended her comment teasingly.
“Mah…” I scoffed together with an embarrassed chuckle. Mom hugged Jackie in return, and then turned towards Esteban to hug him, too. “And you, Esteban. Thank you for taking care of my girls.”
“Aw not a problem, Mrs. L. Don’t worry about it.” Esteban bashfully responded, as him and Jackie began to sit at the dining table, as well.
“No, no… I really – I really mean it.” Mom insisted, as she began to bring the food to the table and the additional plate for Krystal.  “I feel so lucky to call myself the mother of these two amazing women, and so lucky that they were able to find amazing people to take care of them when I couldn’t.”
“Mah…” Jackie and I both bashfully said at the same time.  Krystal and Esteban both just smiled at each of us, enjoying the heartwarming yet embarrassing moment for us, the Liu kids.
“No, no… let me finish.” Mom continued, as she made another trip from the stovetop to the table with the final pots in hand.  She began to sit down, all of us now sitting perfectly around the table. She sat right in between Jackie and I. “And not only do I finally have a nice Adventist boy over for Sunday lunch… I was also brought home a girl.” Mom turned towards me at the end of her sentence, and winked at me from the corner of her eye. I blushed, while everyone else awkwardly chuckled to go along with her apparent joke. Okay… was that her signal to let me know that she knows that Krystal and I are dating? And that she’s okay with it? “Today… is a good day. Let’s say grace.” She continued, as we all held hands around the table, closed our eyes, and my mom lead the prayer. “Heavenly father…” she began. “We thank you for…” and she went on to naming the usual: waking up every morning and being alive, being surrounded by people who love us and that we love, the food on our table, and… “Thank you, Jesus. In your name we pray, Amen…” she finished, and we all said ‘amen’ right after her, but then she leaned towards me discreetly and she took my hand in hers. “… and thank you… for allowing Amber to be herself.” She whispered into my ear, squeezing my hand lovingly and then leaning back into her seat. I turned towards her, pleasantly surprised and I swallowed as to hold back tears. Tears of happiness, of course. Tears of relief. Tears of it-couldn’t-have-been-done-more-perfectly.

Yeah, those kind of tears.

For a moment, I really thought I was getting Punk’d, and that Ashton Kutcher was about to jump out of some random corner and yell ‘haha! Your mom isn’t going to accept you, silly! Get real!’ you know? It was surreal, and the good kind. I think it’s safe to say that it was probably the best lunch I’ve had in my life, and I’ll even go as far as to say that even that is an understatement. We talked about how both Jackie and Esteban were doing with their college classes, how my ‘ankle’ was feeling, and how I was planning on returning back to South Korea to my normal schedule together with Soojung... soon. Krystal got less and less shy towards the end of the lunch, as it was her turn to be asked by my mom about her recent activities. She gave us more details about the reality show her and the rest of the members had just finished filming, filling us in on all of the places they went to, and what they did in each city. I, again, felt like an idiot for missing that; my mom consoled me on my ‘injury’, feeling